


Sunrise, Sunset

by brethilaki



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Angst, Berlin Wall, Feels, Gen, Nostalgia, Sibling Love, references to violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-19
Updated: 2013-01-19
Packaged: 2017-11-26 00:48:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 733
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/644714
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brethilaki/pseuds/brethilaki
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Though the sun rose on his side, Gilbert felt like he was falling—sinking slowly beneath the earth without half so much grace and beauty as the setting sun.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sunrise, Sunset

**Author's Note:**

> History confounds me and I abhor research. I apologize for any glaring inaccuracies.

The eastern face of the Wall was warmest just at noon, when the sun had been hitting it longest and before its shadow had had time to grow. It was this time of day that Gilbert liked to go out, walk straight up to the barrier, take off his gloves and press his bare hands to the warm, hard rock, pretending it was soft skin.

Though the sun rose on his side, Gilbert felt like he was falling—sinking slowly beneath the earth without half so much grace and beauty as the setting sun.

But he was scared to die.

Already he could barely keep body and spirit together—mostly, he believed, because spirit was the only thing he had left; no political body, just the lingering power of identity, culture, and tradition, but how long can national pride last without a nation?

With these thoughts in his head, he pressed his body flush against the unyielding stone and imagined that if, instead of cold soil, he could sink into warm flesh, lose his individuality in the identity of his adopted brother and protégé, he could live with that (or at least die content).

Gilbert's display quickly made him a spectacle among passers-by, and even soldiers guarding the Wall were exchanging questioning glances and words, though fortunately none lacked the sense to hold his fire. A superior officer was sought and informed of the situation, and came to clear Gilbert away from his reveries.

“Sir,” the man addressed him, and waited to be acknowledged. There was at least a ceremonial respect in his actions, but Gilbert could not tell if this was the “sir” of a commanding officer or of a stranger on the streets.

“I'm sorry, sir, but you can't stay here. Come away willingly or we will be forced to send for Comrade Ivan—who will be none too pleased to be distracted from the governance of Nations, to attend to the death throes of a fallen Empire.” At least the charade of his ceremony was uncovered.

Gilbert scowled as he stepped from the growing shadow of the Wall, feeling suddenly pale and insubstantial in the afternoon sun, and reached abortively for the hilt of the sword that no longer hung at his hip. Livid and indignant, unwilling let such insolence stand, he instead pulled himself up to his full height and stared the soldier down with eyes that still shone red as fresh-flowing blood in the sun, old as the mass graves of long-forgotten battles and many times as deep. And though the human's body remained stronger and stiller than Gilbert's, his blue eyes quaked visibly.

“Learn your place, _boy_ ,” Gilbert snarled disdainfully at the middle-aged man, voice crackling with an authority that was stark against the contrast of his physical frailty.

“Yes. Sir.” The officer replied quietly, ashamed at showing his weakness to the younger men. Gilbert regarded him with disfavor for a moment before silently turning away. He managed to walk until he had passed from sight before letting his shoulders drop and his step begin to drag, missing the brush of a scabbard against his thigh. He would spend the rest of the day in his standard-issue apartment, drink his week's ration of beer in one sitting, and read from his diaries as from a psalter—there was little new worthy to record.

Then, when he was drunk enough to blame the blur of his vision on alcohol rather than the tears he would not let himself cry, he would stumble up to the rooftop and watch the sun sink into the earth as he had seen it do countless times over numberless years, red as battle and bright as steel. Finally, overcome with the fear that the sun had at last forsaken him for the West, that he was the one setting and the night would be his tomb, he would crumple to the ground and desperately watch the eastern sky, not finding sleep until the day's first rays met his eyes.  
  
But he would dream of Old Fritz, of storming the Wall, of the flash of steel that would slay the insolent officer in the ensuing battle and for one ironic moment glint in the blood that pooled red against corpse white skin making it shine like his killer's eyes looking coldly down until his life bled out, the first to water Prussia's reclaimed lands.


End file.
